ATM Robbers

My DIL sent me an email and said it came to her company from the Metropolitan Police Department. If you are ever accosted at the ATM machine or grabbed and taken to one and forced to get take out money, don't argue or fuss just go and insert your card BUT instead of your correct pin number put it in backwards.

Example: 1234 is the correct number so you enter 4321 and the bank will give you the money at the same time the police are alerted and sent to the scene to apprehend the robber, and possibly save your life..

I never heard of that Chatty! What a great tip. Thanks, hopefully I'll never need to use it, but I'm glad to have that tidbit tucked away for possible future reference.

Thanks, Chatty, as one just never knows when
something like that will happen.
Cindy

That's a good thing to know, Chatty. I wish and hope they would have a similar thing here.

Is this true all over the states? Elsewhere?

sorry folks, this is another one of those "not quite true" emails. Read below from the Urban Legends website:

"False, for now. The technology exists which would allow ATM users to contact police in an emergency by punching in their PIN (personal identification number) in reverse, but as of this writing it has not yet been implemented anywhere in the United States.

Lawmakers in the states of Kansas and Illinois introduced legislation calling for the institution of reverse-PIN emergency notification systems (also known under the brand name SafetyPIN) in 2004, but the Kansas bill stalled in committee and the Illinois bill was watered down at the behest of the banking industry, making the adoption of the technology purely voluntary -- which it already was.

According to a story published in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch last year, bankers are opposed to the reverse-PIN system because of safety concerns. They worry that ATM users might hesitate or fumble while trying to enter their PINs backwards under duress, possibly increasing the chances of violence. The banking industry is in favor of finding a means to protect ATM customers, a member of the American Bankers Association said, but question whether the reverse-PIN solution is the right one."


I would think that if this sort of thing does come into use at some point down the road, that banks would make a point of "advertising" it to their customers on bank statements, etc. along with other info they give you when they issue bank cards.

Guess I better inform my DIL so she can tell the cop who spoke to her group at work about it , and face to face no less.

Hey Chatty--

That email was circulating around quite a bit but I checked snopes.com and discovered it's NOT true. Check it out:

http://www.snopes.com/business/bank/pinalert.asp

Snopes is a wonderful resource for checking to see if what we hear is actually true or not.

Peace & Blessings,
Beverly Mahone
Author, Whatever! A Baby Boomer's Journey Into Middle Age
Purchase your copy of “Hope for the Holidays” at http://www.talk2bev.com/holiday.htm

“I’m not a writer because I wrote a book. I wrote a book because I was inspired by God.”

Well, I guess if I had read ALL of the posts, I would've discovered someone else already said it wasn't true.

Sorry!